I see you, the real you
by Miss Summer
Summary: In the shadows I can see her while everyone else ignores her presence. To them she’s invisible, a tagalong if such. She walks with her head down, hidden under her hood, as if ashamed of being there, as if afraid of even breathing.Oneshot, DMHG


**A/N: I was just thinking and a baby bunny attacked me! AHHH!!! Lol… A one-shot coming up….**

**Disclaimer: uh, yeh, I don't own Harry Potter, just so you know…**

**One-shot:**

**I see you, the real you**

In the shadows I can see her while everyone else ignores her presence. To them she's invisible, a tag-along if such.

I acknowledged this the first time I saw her enter third year but maybe she was like this before…I just didn't see her then. She was grieving; she was exhausting herself in guilt.

---

She walks with her head down, hidden under her hood, as if ashamed of being there, as if afraid of even breathing.

When they need her, they come running, asking questions, copying her philosophical thoughts as their own. She smiles but it's a bitter smile. It doesn't reach her eyes.

She hears them making fun of her as if she was not there but her cold face mask never falls from its place around them.

She wears baggy clothes, no make up, she doesn't like to look like she's trying to fit in but she sometimes likes to fancy herself up to look like other girls do.

She loves chocolate but doesn't eat it. She laughs like an angel but she lost her true laugh somewhere in time, not even herself is sure when it has disappeared.

She wears her uniform to school, large and perfectly clean and straight though she fells like ripping it from her, it's like a prison for her, a symbol of all she has to keep up to.

She loves sports but does not practice, it's a waist of time for her, she rather study though she hates it so much.

She loves History but everyone says she's going to Law and now she can not take that back.

She always follows the rules and never her heart.

She does not want to disappoint her family, so she disappoints herself.

She's always the first at school and always the last in friendships.

She's the strong one, the one who never cries, the one they can count on when they need…. That's how she's seen.

----

She's strong spirited, she's loving and caring.

She wants to do justice with her hands and make all evil go away.

She loves to be alone in the silence of a dark room.

She's disorganised. She is perfectionist because she makes herself work hard and she loves to feel appreciated. She loves to get top grades, they mean someone is giving her credit for what she does.

She hates to feel trapped.

Her thoughts never stop.

She doesn't sleep all night or barely.

She loves her cat because he's the only one who doesn't disappoint her and that is always there to listen to her.

She's strong, she's a fighter…she doesn't want to fall, she wants to be seen but is too afraid of being seen…wrongly, I may add. To me she's so much more than was she shows to others…that's how I see.

---

I watch from the shadows as she paces her sanctuary, the only place she can let her mask down. When she thinks she's alone, she cries a river. She cries for everything she's feeling for everyone who is hurting worse than her.

She embraces herself in the best book she can find and she reads until the fairytale appears to be real. Her eyes shine dreamily, she smiles as she wishes that fairytale where she'd be the princess and have a prince who'd save her from the evils awaiting her. She sighs and places the book back on the bookshelf. And she shakes those childish thoughts of her head and mutters to herself that life is tough and she has to be too, no princess and princes, no true love and soul mates out there, only people who are important and those who are invisible.

She puts her mask on and walks away from there.

She's afraid inside but no one _sees_ it besides me and her. She manages a bright smile when everyone is around, even if no one sees her exactly as she wished.

She's a shadow in their paths, a miserable pawn that turns into a queen when they are in danger.

They walk by her turning their heads as if she was just a shadow in word. She's shy, she says nothing to them about it but she notices that and it eats her inside.

She lets others decide her faith, her life. She wants to fit in, she wants to be loved and not neglected.

Too afraid of living her life as she wants it, she cries herself to sleep. The next morning her eyes are deeper and redder but no one really notices because she smiles and no one bothers to _see_ past that fake smile.

She puts that innocent face and everyone buys it but she's no more innocent than I am. And I'm certainly not innocent.

She says everything is going great but inside she's wishing someone to see her, to hold her and to kiss her tears goodbye, because, inside nothing is going great, everything is slipping from her hands.

She walks with her arms crossed around her chest, to hold her books she says, but it's to stop shaking. She's nervous, no, she's having a nervous breakdown, she's depressed, she's shattered…she's breaking down…

---

She does not see me there; she can never see me there.

I saw her when I was supposed to be the one not to. She's the supposed enemy, the rival.

But I wish the contact; I want it…so bad it hurts.

I never wish I could not see her, the real her, because it makes me love her instead of loathing her as I did before.

She seemed so perfect, so together. It was unnerving the way she walked, so obediently, so reserved, so perfectly…

And then I saw her if I was seeing myself in the mirror.

She is so crystal to me somehow, so full of doubts that it makes me watch her closer and see her as she is; what she hides so perfectly to the others but not from me.

She would be scared of how much she is visible to me. But should I care? I would like to be seen too…and who better than her to share this burden?

---

He watched as she came into the darkest wing of the library, the one she went for comfort, the one no one knew about besides the librarian and them.

But something made her stop as she was about to sit at the corner of the wing, she looked down and then right to where he usually hid from her view.

'You can come out now, Malfoy. I know you're there, I can see your shadow on the floor' she called.

He stepped from his hiding place.

'How did you know it was me, Granger?' he wondered. He used that hiding place so often when he followed her to the library and she had never seen him before.

She took something from the floor and shoved it into his arms. It was his money bag.

'Who else has a silver money bag with an M in it? Besides when I looked up I saw shadows behind the shelf so I guessed' she said.

'Lucky guess then.' He replied putting it back on his pocket.

'Are going to leave or what?' she wondered in an annoyed and disgusted voice sneering at him. She was there for a reason and Malfoy was in her way to it. She couldn't have his mocking right then, she was on the edge of breaking.

He smirked. She got that from him.

'Quit trying Granger, I sneer better. And no, I'm not leaving. I enjoy this dark corner. I may come here more often' he teased.

'Fine!' she exclaimed grabbing her things and turning to leave.

He grabbed her arm and turned her to face him. She shivered under his touch.

'Not so tough now, uh, Granger.' He smirked one of his most famous smirks.

'Let go off me, Malfoy' she said, her voice shattering as some unleashed tears were fighting to come out.

'What's the matter, Granger? Did Potty or Weasel make fun of your bushy little hair again? Or…let me see... they ignored your attempts to make them study harder? No, no… I know… they called you a bossy little mudblood! After all, that's how they see you!'

He was making fun of her. It was something he couldn't understand why he did it. He loved her but he loved to see her reply him with a force that only that ice mask she wore allowed to. He loved to see her face blanked and her voice completely calm and collected while she insulted him back.

But today she broke, she fell, she cried in front of him.

She felt the tears coming from her eyes and she pulled harder to get free but she couldn't break free from his grip. He was stronger.

He pulled her into his arms after the shock from seeing her break in front of him, from seeing the mask shatter in front of him.

When the first sob reached her mouth she realised their position: Malfoy was comforting her and she was crying in front of her worst enemy.

She pulled away and tried to put the cold wall around her heart and her emotions, block them inside but somehow she couldn't.

'What do you think you're doing, Malfoy?' she hissed.

'I-'

'This is all I needed. Now, I'll have everyone making fun of me because I cried in the arms of my enemy, humiliated myself in front of him… Oh! Harry and Ron will hate me or ignore my justification… I will be left with no friends…' she ranted hysterically. Malfoy pulled her into his embrace once more. He could not leave her this way, not now that he had decided to make up to her.

'Shh, everything is going to be fine…shh.'

'They died, they died…I'm alone now…died..dead…' she sobbed.

He continued to hold her and saying everything would be alright, that she was not alone.

She felt warmer than before, his arms around her petite figure, his heart beating against her…

She felt save, she felt calm, secure…something she was not used to feel for a long time.

'I thought you hated me, Malfoy'

'No, I do not, Granger. I rather like you'

'Why don't you? Everyone else neglects me or hates me. Even my parents used to say I was not good enough, not perfect enough…' she replied lifting her head to see his face looking down to her, concern written in his blue eyes.

There was a silence between them, Hermione parted herself from his arms but he left his hands in hers.

'You are not unworthy of life, Hermione. You are worthy of such more than you're current one.'

'Am I? How can you tell that? You don't even know me, Malfoy. No one does' she let go of his hands and turned again to walk away cleaning the vestiges of her fallen tears.

He saw her walk from him but finally he called after her.

'Because I can see you, Hermione. And you're nothing less than a lost child that needs to be seen, to be loved'

She turned around to face him one last time.

He smiled.

'What?' she gasped.

'You're lonely though you have thousands around you; you smile when you want nothing but to cry; you say you hate me but inside you want to wrap your arms around me and feel mine around you; isn't it right, Hermione?' he said calmly walking slowly to where she stood.

She understood that current feeling that she had, the feeling of having someone following her, like she was never alone… and she wasn't.

'Why?' she asked.

'Because you caught my attention and you were so much like me. I just couldn't stop before understanding every detail, every problem. I saw you depressing throughout the year and I was worried. You carry this cool mask but inside I'm the mirror of your soul. You're so much like me, Granger, admit it, you're like little bouncing ferret over here. Both did things they regret and can't show their true colours out of fear'

She slapped him tears in her eyes.

'That is for being a nosy little bouncing ferret!' she hissed but then she pushed his head down into her lips.

They kissed for the first time and she felt wonderful. When she parted from the kiss, her eyes closed, she knew that that feeling inside her in that moment was worth to fight for.

'And that is for seeing me when no one else did' she said softly against his lips. He smiled against her lips and kissed her more passionately.

'I shall kiss you tears goodbye and you shall kiss mine' he promised before closing once more the gap between them. It was the start of their new life, a love life that would make the others envy because they needed each other, they wanted each other and more importantly, they saw each others true colours.

--

It was then that she knew she would fall in love and that she was no longer a shadow.

---

**A/N: Please tell me what you think, I'll try update my other fic this weekend…**

**Sorry,**

**Eve**


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